The present invention relates generally to a gear box cover for a racing car for which rapid access is required, and, more particularly, to a cover for a rear end gear box on a race car, such as a sprint race car, modified, late model, and/or street rods, which provides internal access to the gear box through manipulation of a single connector member.
Race cars, particularly sprint cars and smaller racing cars, are powered by an engine supported in a frame and connected to a rear end gear box that transfers rotational power to the rear wheels of the racing car. The rear end gear box has a pair of intermeshed gears with an input gear associated with the drive input from the engine and a transfer gear transferring rotational power from the input gear driven from the engine to the rear wheels of the racing car. Depending on the configuration of the rotational components of the rear end of the racing car, the input and transfer gears can be vertically aligned or offset horizontally as depicted in FIG. 1 and described in greater detail below. In either prior art configuration, the rear end gear box is provided with a cover that is secured to the gear box housing by fasteners and sealed with a gasket or O-ring. Whenever access to the interior of the rear end gear box is required, the fasteners must be disengaged from the housing to allow the cover to be removed.
Removal of the cover on the rear end gearbox is necessary to replace the input and/or transfer gears to maintain or repair the rear end gear box. In some instances, both the input and transfer gears are removed and replaced with similar input and transfer gears having different gear ratios. The input and transfer gears are splined onto the respect input shaft from the engine and the parallel transfer shaft that delivers rotational power to the rear end and the rear wheels. The cover is provided with a pair of bearings that rotatably support the respect ends of the input and transfer shafts beyond the mounting of the input and transfer gears. These bearings require a certain thickness in the cover in order to support the bearings for operative use.
The removal of the rear end gear box cover requires the manipulation of each of several bolts that secure the cover onto the gear box housing. Each bolt is threaded into a boss on the gear box housing and requires a socket wrench to remove each respective bolt. This process of removing the rear end gear box cover typically takes approximately twenty minutes to accomplish. If required prior to the start of a race, or even during the race, this length of time to remove the bolts securing the cover to the gear box housing can make the difference between racing and not racing.
Therefore, it would be desirable to provide a rear end gear box for a racing car that could be easily and quickly removed to permit access to the input and transfer gears within the rear end gear box.